EFFORTPOST Am I asexual?

So what goes into a thread that catches attention:

• Education - we see this with @kaamrev. Individuals who would normally would not care about world politics suddenly want to read. You are a smart, eloquent, dramanaut. Evidently, @kaamrev is skilled at finding obscure yet important topics that are impossible to turn away from. I wish to capture the same beautiful curiosity. As Goggins would put it, @kaamrev I'm here to take your soul. I refuse to have anyone exceed me as a writer. Anything but that, regardless of the context. Frick more than me, have a better family, earn more degrees, but you will not outwrite me. I will take your soul if you dare try, and you will be an empty shell at the end of it, aware that you're pursuing a futile task you cannot succeed at.

There is nothing more futile than trying to outwrite me, though I am not the greatest writer ever. I failed to get my English PhD, but I will rip your soul from your body if you want to compete on this platform. South African history? The plight of the Black man? My personal experiences? We are yin and yang, and so long as you put words to pages, you'll find me not far behind.

• Taking souls - When I work out at home, I see a specific face. It's someone who physically looked at me, reveling in her power over me. That face can motivate me to do anything, even wreck a small girl. I know I have the discipline to work on my body, I just need direction. That's why I've seen a personal trainer. The trainer can teach me the how and the where but they can't answer the biggest question - why. For me, it's that look of impunity. “I could slap you and nobody would do anything. I have all the power and you have none. Nobody here will protect you because you are powerless.” Nobody will ever make me feel like that ever again and I swear to god if a woman did that to me again I'd clock them in the face. Yes, my flame is a female face.

So, no need for further delays. In this post, I'd like to three important topics

1. Why I quit my PhD after 4 years

2. Phyiscal trainer

3. Clubbing

4. Asexuality

Why I quit my PhD after 4 years

I find myself at a strange threshold. On the one hand and I've thrown away 4 years of thesis research and missed the PhD by age 30 club. This doesn't mean I've given up on ideas I once held strongly enough to write endlessly on them with fervent passion. I'm still a dedicated Jungian and follower of Campbell - university just isn't the right place to explore these concepts.

On the other hand, I'm currently living through the happiest era of my life, and while problems still plague me as they do us all, I am extremely grateful that I no longer have to deal with the university of the department I was part of. To be specific, I can go weeks without even knowing what “cruelty” is.

When I arrived at Rhodes University, I came as a science student and the primary goal was to acquire a computer science degree and become a software engineer. But I have a love of literature, so I also enrolled in the English department. This ultimately meant I was taking more credits than your regular science student, but the sacrifice was worth it for me if it meant that I could explore the world of literature with experts.

I arrived in 2014, and the English department was more than I could hope for. The texts I was exposed to expanded my mind and all ideas of what literature is capable of. Texts like New York Trilogy and Bartleby, the Scrivener set the tone, and I was so invested in learning more. This was 2014. Since then, I've watched the quality of texts deteriorate rapidly. We are currently in a situation where you can earn your Ph.D. without having ever read Shakespeare. You can get your bachelor's degree without knowing who Carl Jung or Joseph Campbell are.

Having tutored for years, I've watched how the kinds of books on offer have changed, and how they are deliberately pointed toward obvious political conclusions. It's a wave of Nervous Conditions followed by The Handmaid's Tale in case you didn't get it the first time. None of these texts are inherently bad - my issue is that they were purely springboards to predetermined political topics.

But that isn't why I left. In fact, it has very little to do with my decision at all. I left because I felt hated, worthless, and completely unwanted. I was shown unbridled contempt, made to know I am a disgusting, wretched human being who is entirely inadequate.

It came from the texts I was being exposed to.

More than that, it came from the people that surrounded me. I was hated and rejected. I'm not a perfect person. I've made terrible mistakes in my past, ones that I'm still attempting to mend to this day. I've lied and been late and…. said I think chick lit is easy. I don't believe this justifies castigation for literal years. After psychological care, I am not of the belief that my flaws justify my dark descent into severe self-harm, a chasm I have yet to levitate my way out of.

Every human being is born flawed. We will die flawed. And in the time between the spark of divinity shines within us all. Hence, we're all equals, from the pauper to the prince. Revolutionary!

To say there are two sides to every story is an understatement. Any narrative has as many sides as there are observers. I know that there will be some who read this with glee, knowing I've fallen short of my academic goals. Undoubtedly, others will believe I received every I deserve in a meeting of justice.

That's okay. You can't hurt me. No, I'm not where I want to be in life just yet. I will earn my Ph.D., and I will do so without sacrificing my self-worth. Baby steps.

personal trainer

The main problem I was noticing was that my exercises were helping me lose weight, but they were not help me with muscle. Here's an image of a typical exercise day, don't laugh please, I started from scratch after car accident.

It helped me get from 58kg to 50kg so it works for weight loss. Now I want muscle gain but I want muscle and I don't know what to do despite Human Kinentics being one of my majors. I called a personal trainer, she asked me some questions, then wanted to evaluate me irl. We shared messages were I spilled spaghetti HARD. She must think I'm r-slurred after that. She said she'll see me at 5:30PM. I was like okay, 5:30AM, and she had to clarify.

I got awoken by neighbours having s*x so I decided to work on this document since sleep is slow to return. It took me a long time to get to this point, where I want my physique to scare others. For the longest, I thought it was wrong to be male,and that making myself as harmless as possible is the solution.

Some of it is fueled by my father who was a violent person so I associate rage, violence, and evil all as one. I'm learning to separate the monster from the father. Sometimes, people need to be scared because they won't respect you. It's a worst-case scenario but violence and fear are necessary.

clubbing

I want to go to nightclub. I am thinking of asking my headdresser if he wants to go out some time. Maybe, but I also want the challenge of going alone sober so I can enjoy benzoes. I'll leave sober, take an uber, then arrive and take 4-5 pills. I'lll be the same as a drunk person which should be perfect for the club.

That's Saturday evening after the morning hike. I'll probably take a nap between.

asexuality

So, what is asexuality?

Asexuality is an identity which lies outside the bounds of heteronormativity. As a consequence, it is an identity that is often misunderstood, and those who identify as asexual may have trouble articulating their authentic selves to others and understanding themselves using the lenses given to them by society.

Part of this inscrutability is motivated by assumptions made about humans that are defied by asexual identities. Humans are considered to be creatures with innate sexual desires. One of the most pervasive social assumptions is that all humans possess sexual desire. This is typically referred to as the ‘sexual assumption'. The sexual assumption manifests in various fields of knowledge such as psychology and medicine where sexuality is seen as a natural, healthy and essential aspect of the human, and the possibility of an asexual human has been recognized only relatively recently, and then solely in pathologizing terms.

Even psychoanalysts such as Sigmund Freud (I hate this man0 assume a “sexual basis to basically the entire range of human psychology” (Elizabeth Hanson). Thus, not unexpectedly, research by Cara MacInnes et al reveals that “sexual desire is considered a key component of human nature, and those lacking it are viewed as relatively deficient and less human. Hence, in a questionnaire distributed among undergraduate students, “asexuals were attributed significantly lower uniquely human traits than any other sexual orientation group” (MacInnes et al 731).

So am I asexual?

Okay, so I come home and see my neighobr's window open. That makes me think “yay, at least no s*x sounds.” I was wrong. They still frick loudly. I do get some relief that these folks in particular are peepee fricks involving the rest of the world in their fetish.

Not writing much tonight because I'm taking a large dose of Benzos to calm some driving and work-related anxiety I'm in.

I've been asking myself this question. DO I truly want s*x? The truth is that I want to pair-bond with the opposite s*x. I saw a personal trainer and we set up a regime. I need to eat 5x a day instead of 2 and I need protein shakes. I can't do weight gain on my own.

I'lll conclude with a quote that sums up my thoughts:

“Rather than love, than money, than fame, give me truth.”

It is not true that I am asexual.